Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin - Quite a read!!

This book is about Abraham Lincoln as a leader, a manager and a politician.

Once elected to the presidency, one of the first things Abraham Lincoln did was to select his cabinet. He selected the very three men that he beat out for the 1860 Republican presidential nomination to hold three important positions in his administration:

1. William H. Seward, a former governor and senator of New York, became Secretary of State.
2. Salmon P. Chase, a former governor and senator from Ohio, became Treasury Secretary.
3. Edward Bates, an elder statesman and former Missouri congressman, became Attorney General.

Lincoln selected a fourth political competitor, Edwin M. Stanton, as his Secretary of War.
Lincoln's reasoning was that with the slave crisis threatening the country, he needed the strongest men surrounding him.

"Every member of his administration was better known, better educated, and had more experience in public life than Lincoln. Their presence in the cabinet might have threatened to eclipse the obscure prairie lawyer from Springfield. It soon became clear, however, that Abraham Lincoln, would emerge the undisputed captain of this most unusual cabinet, truly a team of rivals." (Doris Kearns Goodwin)

I find it amazing that Lincoln was able to choose some of his fiercest rivals to work so closely with him during his presidency. But more amazing still is that these very men became some of his closest friends and strongest supporters. When Lincoln was assassinated, John Hay, Lincoln's personal secretary, reported that their grief was uncontrollable.

What an amazing book this is. Not only did I find the book historically interesting and informative, I think it is has some good lessons for people that work together as a team.

Communicating with Skype and CamTwist

This morning my teammates and I spent some quality time using 4 programs: CamTwist, Skype, UStream TV, and YugmaSkype. Today I will show what CamTwist and Skype can do. Later this week, I will discuss UStreamTV and YugmaSkype.

CamTwist is a software package that lets you add special effects to your video chats. It's also possible to stream your desktop and still images. I like the picture in picture (PIP) as well. With CamTwist, you can also use multiple video chat programs at the same time. Some fun effects we tried are: halo, thought bubble, comic book, and N-Square. In this image my colleague PJ is shown using the effect N-Square full screen while I am in PIP with a thought bubble in the bottom left corner.

Skype allows you to make calls from your computer — free to other people on Skype and cheap to landlines and cell phones around the world.

When using CamTwist and Skype together, Open CamTwist first then follow these steps:
In Step 1, click on "Desktop" as your video source, click "Select" at the bottom of the video source list. Next in Step 1, click on "Webcam" as another video source, and then click "PIP" (which stands for picture in picture) at the bottom of the video source list.

In Step 2, have some fun by adding an effect or two. To see a preview of how CamTwist will look. Go up to the menu and choose "Preview". Check out these cool effects: Cube, Fire, Halo, and Snow.Step 3 allows you to adjust your settings. Lastly, in the last box, settings, adjusting the scale slider allows the viewer to see either more of you or more of your desktop. Nudging the PIP black box will position where the PIP will be located on your screen.
Let's take a look at what the viewer sees. My colleague is seeing my desktop with a small streaming video of me in the upper right hand corner. This is a very cool way to chat and show your screen simultaneously.


Check back soon to see how we used these two programs along with UStreamTV and YugmaSkype.

Thanks to Darren Draper for teaching me these programs!

Senuti

This week my nephew Aaron asked me how to get his iTunes music from his iPod onto his MacBook Pro (running Leopard). He had all of his music synced to his old PC.

We used Senuti (iTunes spelled backwards) which allows you to transfer songs from your iPod to your computer. It worked fairly well. I had used Senuti once before to move music from my daughter's iPod to her MacBook (running Tiger).

Tansferring songs on a Tiger machine was simple. We could select all the songs at once and click on transfer. But Leopard offered us a challenge. We could only transfer about 50 songs at once. When we tried more than that, the transfer did not work. I do not know if this is a Leopard bug or a Senuti bug. Nevertheless, the songs are transferred and Aaron is happy with the result.

Senuti has written explicit instructions on how to transfer music from your iPod to your computer, so be sure to read them before you use it.

Utah 6th Graders Tour the Globe

What an exciting day we had in the computer lab. Mrs. Robison's 6th grade class toured Google Earth, locating their favorite place on the planet. We turned an iPod into a recording studio by attaching a device called a MicroMemo, sold at XtremeMac.com.

Mrs. Robison and I interviewed students, asking the which place they chose as their favorite. The answers ranged from Pearl Harbor to the Roman Colosseum to Brighton, England. The students did a super job at responding to questions and recording a podcast.

We also had the class give a loud cheer on the podcast for their favorite football team: BYU or the U of U. Give it a listen and we will leave you to judge who the winner was.

Please notice a poll on the right hand side of this page. Please will you vote for your favorite place on earth---well, actually you only get to choose the continent upon which your favorite place is located--- but please vote. Inquiring minds in Mrs. Robison's class want to know.

Music to My Ears

Today I learned something new about music. Our team had a music Professor Alan Kaschub from the University of Southern Maine (School of Music) show us how to use USB keyboards along with an Apple application called Garageband.

We created a short song such as Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, added some percussion sound effects, and learned a bit about writing a music score in a free program called FinaleNotePad. You not only write the music in Finale, but you can listen to it as well. This is an amazing program!

The most fun I have ever had in my music lessons was to watch my sister Annie crawl across the piano teacher's living room floor to retrieve a penny that I had rolled across the floor. Having baited my poor sister to crawl after the penny, I was in an advantageous position to watch Mrs. Geiger's reaction.

With Garageband and FinaleNotePad, I can actually write a cool rap song about that scarring experience!

Mrs. Robison's Class Loves Google Earth

We traveled from Edgemont Elementary to Pyramids of Giza to Lagoon Amusement Park to a student's house to Mile High Stadium in Denver and we saw people walking around the Eiffel Tower.

We hope enjoy listening to a few comments from Mrs. Robison's class. Check back next week for more Google Earth fun.
Mrs. Robison's Cool Class

Bungee Jumping Anybody?

I figure if you can view a bungee jumping platform from space, it's got to be a doozie. This bungee jumper's delight is found near Victoria Falls in southern Africa. Can you see it in the bottom left quadrant of this image? For a visit to this area, check out Google Sightseeing.

Situated on the border between Zambia and Zimbabwe, Victoria Falls is one of the most amazing sights on earth. The falls are, by some measures, the largest waterfalls in the world, as well as being among the most unusual in form, and having arguably the most diverse and easily-seen wildlife of any major waterfall site. (wikipedia.org)

People in the area call Victoria Falls “the smoke that thunders”. Looking at this image from Google Earth, we begin to understand why. I hope someday to travel to Victoria Falls, but I may have to work up the courage to strap on the bungee cords and take a dive from the bridge.

The students in Mrs. Robison's 6th grade class at Edgemont Elementary will go on a virtual tour of Victoria Falls with me this week. They are really nice students so I enjoy visiting their class. I hope they like the bungee platform, and maybe they know of some really cool places seen on Google Earth.

Special note: Happy birthday Jeannie!